This is excellent news. The closure of Reactor 4 at the Kansai Electric Ohi nuclear power plant (following the shutdown of Reactor 3 earlier this month) offers the Japanese government the perfect opportunity to devote every resource to bringing the Fukushima crisis under control and leading the country to a sustainable future.

Stemming the torrent of highly radioactive water leaking from the destroyed Fukushima reactors and stabilizing the situation, along with phasing out Japan’s nuclear power infrastructure, should be Prime Minister Abe’s first and only priorities.

He should immediately abandon his plans to restart Japan’s 50 shutdown reactors and stop his sales trips to sell discredited nuclear technology overseas.

Clean and sustainable energy is the only way to protect us all from the risks of nuclear power. People in Japan and industry there have already begun its shift to renewables. Since April of last year, 3.36 GW of renewable energy generation equipment was installed across the country. The country could quickly become a global leader in wind, solar and geothermal technologies.

It has an immense coastline, offering huge opportunities for offshore wind power. The amount of solar radiation that Japan receives from the sun offers the potential for high productivity of solar PV. It also has a unique resource in geothermal energy, which can produce electricity and heat.

Sadly, Japan has neglected these opportunities to develop these natural resources because nuclear lobby groups have pushed their technology and the current government has been fixated on restarting reactors rather than developing a clean energy future. History will judge the nuclear industry and its backers harshly.

Nuclear power has been and always will be a roadblock to a cleaner, safer and sustainable future. Greenpeace has provided a roadmap to this future. This roadmap shows that if Japan had adopted a strong strategy last year, it could have doubled renewables to 20.3% by 2015 and increased the renewable supply to 43% by 2020. All it would take is for the Japanese government to remove barriers.

The result of this has been a huge increase in energy from fossil fuels. So because of public pressure, on a matter which very few of them understand,...

The result of this has been a huge increase in energy from fossil fuels. So because of public pressure, on a matter which very few of them understand, Japan is now using a dirtier form of energy. Renewables still only make up a small percentage of energy production, and as Germany proved, having large scale renewables

Alishaw,
Any future reactor restart in Japan is related more to nuclear proliferation, capital already invested in a risky proposition like nucl...

Alishaw,
Any future reactor restart in Japan is related more to nuclear proliferation, capital already invested in a risky proposition like nuclear generation ($$$) and support of Japanese nuclear industry (more $$$) than to anything else. How cleanly the Japanese are burning the coal and the gas that make up for the 50 nuclear reactors currently stopped is something nobody appears to care for (definitely not the Japanese media).

The people of Japan should be able to decide whether they want nuclear generation, even if people like you say that the general public does not understand the issue. This is what democracy is about.

Renewable energy has the economic and technical potential to replace the entire nuclear electricity production in Japan. However, for a very limited period of time, some existing gas power plants have to increase their output while the renewable energy capacity will be installed. New fossil fuel power plants don´t need to be built (as detailed in our Energy [R]evolution Japan, 2012). This moderate increase of CO2 emissions can be saved in the transport sector for example. The overall CO2 emissions of Japan will not increase in the mid-term as renewables and the more efficient use of energy will replace nuclear power entirely and will make Japan independent from both dangerous nuclear power and fossil fuel imports.

Japan might be 'free from nuclear power' but the Japanese will continue to suffer the effects of exposure to Fukushima's discharges of poi...

Japan might be 'free from nuclear power' but the Japanese will continue to suffer the effects of exposure to Fukushima's discharges of poisonous radioactive gases for thousands of years. As will anyone taking part in the Tokyo Olympics or going along to watch them.
Japan is even more dangerous now than it was after Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Liquid discharges into the Pacific are already affecting the West Coast of America. Atmospheric discharges are not confined by any political or geographical boundaries; they're being blown around everywhere.

Japan does *not* have a capacity problem: this summer has been exceptionally hot and yet all electricity demand has been satisfied with ample margin (...

Japan does *not* have a capacity problem: this summer has been exceptionally hot and yet all electricity demand has been satisfied with ample margin (5% according to today's Tokyo Shinbun). This summer there was essentially *no* request to the citizens to save energy.

Regrettably electric utilities in Japan keep threatening the citizens with blackouts for the upcoming winter even though this summer there was a comfortable overcapacity (in Japan peak consumption is higher in summer, because of air conditioning). Hopefully Japanese citizens have understood by now that this seasonal crying wolf is only propaganda.

Furthermore, Japan is building new gas plants and securing gas supplies from the US, where npp are closing down one after another.

Regrettably Japan is not investing much in renewables and liberalization of the grid should be done faster.

Regrettably Japan is not doing much to save energy, including in the transportation sector, where a lot of material that used to travel by ship only a few years ago is now moved using trucks.

Pro-nuke Yomiuri Shinbun article (http://the-japan-news.com/news/article/0000619889) appears to contain several sentences that could be construed as propaganda aiming to mislead the public opinion.

"Despite a record-breaking heat wave this summer, such problems as a massive power outage were avoided. This can be attributed to the power-saving efforts of businesses and households as well as the strenuous efforts of utilities to supply power."

No power saving was requested to households for this summer. Japan never experienced massive power outages, not even right after the March 2011 disaster.

"However, the utilities walked a tightrope in meeting power demand."

Not true, see below.

"KEPCO’s excess supply capacity on this day [Aug. 22] dropped temporarily to 4 percent, only one percentage point above the 3 percent regarded as the threshold for causing a blackout."

Not true: 3% excess capacity is the threshold that utilities consider safe for operation. Obviously going below 3% will not cause a blackout and Kepco only briefly dropped to 4%.

"It is far too optimistic to believe that adequate power supplies can be secured without the help of nuclear reactors, merely because there were no blackouts in summer."

What can I say? If Japan still had excess capacity during a record breaking hot summer I am not concerned at all for the upcoming winter.